


Violet Pulse

by colberry



Category: the GazettE
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, But Then Adolescence Happened, Childhood Friends, Childhood Sweethearts, Feels, Gratuitous Smut, Growing Up Together, M/M, Mistaken Identity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-08
Updated: 2013-10-07
Packaged: 2017-12-28 19:22:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/995590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/colberry/pseuds/colberry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eight-years-old, Yuu blushed -- an innocent red dusting his cheeks as he ducked his head away from Kouyou's sight.  He swallowed, his lungs stammering because he had these weird, wiggly things inside of him that made his stomach clench.  And made his heart beat fast.  And made Kouyou feel right.  Somehow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Age 8

_Age 8_  
  
  
The sun was sticky against his back, the pulsating rays of summer making the white cast on his right arm painfully itch.  Yuu scowled from his spot on the grass, legs akimbo, and tried to dig the fingertips of his left hand into the water-tight crevices of that annoying contraption.  
  
He found himself plopped down on the sidelines of the soccer field this random Tuesday afternoon.  His mother was chatting amiably with his baseball coach on the other side of the field.  Her dainty hands periodically gestured toward her pouting child, her voicing trilling her concern over when he would be able to play again.  
  
 _Hopefully never_ , Yuu bitterly thought.  
  
His eyes warily watched the children on the soccer field kick the ball aimlessly along the yellow-tinged grass.  Small cleats roughly dug into the ground, dirt exploding from each clumsy kick and unnecessary dive.  But the laughter was perfect.  It made Yuu draw his knees up to his chin and wrap his arms awkwardly around them, the cumbersome cast being the main interloper.  Dark, ebony eyes kept their gaze upon the young boys his age, let their smiles sink into his memory to return to later when he remembers his friends consist of imaginary ponderings.   

Yuu was a serious child.  His mother would proclaim his impressive maturity, his untimely wisdom.  His classmates would avert their eyes and murmur of the boy’s cold exterior, his hurtful apathy.  Yuu would merely say, with all the sagacity of an eight-year-old, he was making sure his heart didn’t hurt again. 

His father had left him when he was six.  He didn’t get a kiss goodbye.  Rather, he got a bellowing holler that _it was all his fault_.  His mother didn’t get a farewell embrace.  Instead, she was bestowed a lovely bruise upon her left cheek.  Yuu remembered the shape of the purple and blue mark.  It looked just like a heart.  He had clutched at his own chest, whispered to his mother who had sunken to her knees, that he would _make the hurt stop, okay?_

Yuu absently picked at the plaster of his cast, eyes following the ball, occasionally glancing up to peer at the boys’ faces.  He made a game of it:  would they be smiling, concentrated, laughing, unsure?  He let his tongue run across his lips, the dry and chapped things so _thirsty_.  He stole a glance across the field.  His mother was still jabbering, still gesturing animatedly while his coach looked on with an air of indifference.  A small sigh escaped him, returning his eyes to the soccer players.  The juice box would have to wait.

He let his shoe scuff a bit at the lonely dirt patch that tainted the emerald grass he was seated upon.  The white top of his Chucks quickly became streaked with brown.  Yuu smiled at his sordid creation – it looked just like those soccer boys’ cleats.  Rough, dirty, well-used.  Laughter.

“Ah, heads up!”

Yuu tore his eyes away from his dirtied shoe to see a soccer ball lazily roll towards him.  He blinked at it.  The malformed cuts and scrapes against its soft surface seemed to catch the glint of the sun. 

“Sorry about that, sir.”  Yuu snapped his head up, catching the eyes of the young boy who sheepishly uttered the apology.  He wore a shy smile, a splatter of dirt on one cheek and his black hair was tousled carelessly from zipping through the wind. 

The boy bent down to pick up the wayward ball and before Yuu could stop himself, he blurted out, “Why’d you call me ‘sir’?  I’m not old.”

The boy pouted his lips and Yuu found that he was entranced by their odd, yet pleasing shape, “S’polite.”

“Yeah, for an old guy.”

“Well – ”

“Kou~  Why is it taking you a _bajillion years_ to get the ball?!”

‘Kou’ let out a small gasp from those bowed lips of his and quickly twisted around to face the annoyed voice.  Yuu raised an eyebrow – the other boy was short and tan, unlike Kou’s lanky frame and creamy skin.  His black hair was buzzed and he wore an odd bandage on his nose, hiding most of his scowling face from view.   
  
Kou started to sputter, “I wasn’t taking a _bajillion_ years, ‘Kira.  Get some patience, jeez.”

‘Kira glared at the taller boy before his eyes found Yuu, who was watching the exchange with slight envy.  He glowered at the way the two boys’ shoulders bumped together, how they entered each others' space-bubble so casually.  _He_ wanted to have a companion of his own.  Someone to get grass stains with and share juice boxes and tell each other to ‘ _get some patience, jeez’_. 

‘Kira studied his figure for a second before he bluntly pointed with his finger, “What’s that on your arm?”

Yuu felt his hackles raise, “What’s that on your face?”

‘Kira paused, eyes wide and a blush creeping on the top edges of his nose-bandage.  He self-consciously poked at it before he gained back a smidgen of confidence.  The shorter boy roughly jabbed a finger into Kou’s side, making the other squeak out in protest and squirm away, “ _This moron_ pushed me off a cliff.”

Kou immediately balked before Yuu’s eyes even had the chance to grow to the size of watermelons, “ _What!_   It was _not_ a cliff.  And it was an accident!!  I didn’t know that you stopped walking and I was too busy telling you about the newest Game-Boy and I fell on you and you cut your nose on that bush!”

‘Kira smirked at his flustered friend, waving a dismissive hand at him, “Yeah, yeah.  The police didn’t buy it either.”

“ _The police?!_   Stop lying!  He’s gonna think I’m – ”

“So,”  Akira smiled over to Yuu who was trying to hide his amusement behind his casted arm, “What’s your story?”  
  
Yuu paused in his muffled laughter to blink helplessly at the two eager faces that were suddenly looming close with something akin to glee shining in their eyes.  He shifted uncomfortably.  Was he supposed to spin a wild tale involving explosions and awesome dive-rolls and perhaps a dinosaur to ‘explain’ the molded plaster on his arm?  Or was he supposed to tell a more boring truth? 

Yuu glanced at Akira’s noseband and then to his own injury before his eyes were drawn to Kou’s warm gaze.  He found that he couldn’t stop staring at the taller boy, watching as the stray wind ruffled his raven locks and how he absently bit his plump lip in anticipation.  The sun seemed to gravitate toward the boy’s eager smile and Yuu had to force himself to blink and look away – back to Akira’s less patient stare.

“I fell.”

Akira’s expectant face dropped in a second less than instant, mouth agape and eyes incredulous, “ _What?!_   After that awesome story I told you, that’s all you’re giving us?”

Yuu stared blankly at Akira, inwardly smirking at how the shorter boy seemed to be turning an interesting shade of red.  Kou quickly placed an exasperated hand to Akira’s shoulder, rolling his chocolate eyes.  Yuu found himself immediately honing in on the casual placement of hand-to-shoulder.  Something twisted in his stomach.  His brow furrowed.

“Jeez, with something so _cool_ on your arm, I thought you’d be interesting,” Akira swiped the ball from Kou, who had cradled it on his hip, before stomping away in a huff to the flock of boys in the distance who had already given up on the lost soccer ball and found another to kick haphazardly.

Kou had his head swiveled in the direction Akira disappeared to, a light frown gracing his round face, and Yuu turned away.  The quiet boy tugged on a piece of grass, knowing the other would assuredly follow his friend and leave the ‘boring’ kid to himself.  Whatever, it didn’t matter – Yuu didn’t need them ( _him_ ) anyway.  He twisted the blade harshly.  He didn’t need anybody.  He liked just-watching anyway, he liked being by himself with no one to bother him and no one to say ‘ _get some patience, jeez_ ’ to him, _ever_.  Yuu quickly let go of the green tendril to roughly wipe at his eye where a peculiar wetness had snuck into –

“Sorry, sir.  Akira’s not used to dealing with normal people.” 

Yuu jerked his head up to see Kou smiling that sheepish smile at him again, hand behind his head and eyes laughing.  Something skipped in his chest.  Maybe he was dehydrated, that thing his mother always warned him about every summer.  He needed that juice box, stat.

“Don’t call me that.  Call me Yuu, weirdo.”

Kou’s smile widened as he plopped on the ground in front of him, knees digging into the grass, and leaned in with childish enthusiasm, “Then call me Kouyou.  Akira says that he’s the only one allowed to call me ‘Kou’, so I guess you can’t call me that…”

The elder's eyes blackened fiercely and somewhere inside of him, he wondered why such a silly thing made his blood spit fire. 

Yuu grit his teeth and grumbled, “Why not?” 

Kouyou looked taken aback, smile disappearing and a nervous gulp cutting the tense air around them.  He gripped his knees tighter and slowly drawled, “Well, I don’t know.  That’s just how it always is.”

Kouyou paused, looking down at the space between his grass-stained knees and Yuu’s milky legs, “I don’t really get it though,”  He suddenly faced Yuu with a bright grin, “But you can call me anything else!  Anything!”   
  
The wind seemed to sigh hard in that moment, whipping Kouyou’s ebony mane to fall into his eyes.  As the other boy giggled at his sudden blindness, Yuu’s vicious expression lost its might, a softer doe-like countenance appearing on the young boy’s face.  With wide eyes, he watched how the other boy grinned at him like the world was theirs. 

He didn’t know what to call him.

He didn’t know how to place any name on something so… _perfect._

Kouyou eagerly awaited to hear this strange, quiet boy’s answer.  But, as the seconds passed, and the boy remained silent as he helplessly bit his bottom lip in indecision, Kouyou felt his optimism start to slip again.

“…Yuu?”

_Uruha._

“I like ‘Kouyou’.  It’s good.”

Kouyou blinked before he smiled in pure delight.  He stuck out a hand with zeal, “Pleasure to make your acquaintance, Mr. Yuu.”  The boy leaned in further with a proud expression as he whispered, “I heard a grown-up say that in a movie once.”

Yuu found a smile start to sweep across his face and he let the other boy grab onto the fingers poking out of his cast, “Nice to meet you, too.”

  
&&

  
Yuu found himself sitting in the grass at the edge of the soccer field every Tuesday after that.  His mother tsked when she saw the emerald stains on his shorts and his ruddy fingernails from planting his hand in the dirt all day, but Yuu didn’t care.  His cast itched and his restless youth needed to get _out_.  He was tired of splaying lazily across the couch, watching reruns of classic comedy routines, and he wanted to see Kouyou again.  And again.

Tuesdays usually meant laundry-day and ham-sandwich-day.  But now, as Yuu clambered down the sloping hill towards the field, they meant good-day – Kouyou-day.  He told the taller boy this.

Kouyou leaned in like he always did, and touched his ankle, “You need a day too!” 

He always touched him.  Constant contact.  Just in case one of them may suddenly disappear.

Yuu shook his head, his growing ebony locks catching the wind, and logically pointed out, “I didn’t do anything to earn myself a day.”

The blond-haired boy pouted for a minute, tilting his head to the side.  Yuu tried to keep his gaze from wandering to those girlish lips, but he _needed_ to watch them part and speak nevertheless.

“What did _I_ do?”

Yuu blushed, an innocent red dusting his cheeks as he ducked his head away from Kouyou’s sight.  He swallowed, his lungs stammering because he had these weird, wiggly things inside of him that made his stomach clench.  And made his heart beat fast.  And made Kouyou feel _right_.  Somehow.

Yuu bit the corner of his lip before shrugging, reaching out towards a dandelion beside him to tug on meekly, “Nothing I guess.  You were just there when I needed something good.”

Kouyou gave a lopsided smile, watching the elder boy fumble with the dead flower, spraying fluffy seeds everywhere.

The soccer player crawled over from his spot in front of Yuu to sit by his side.  He craned his neck down to try and catch the quiet boy’s eye, but the other diligently observed the dandelion blow apart and scatter across the burnt grass.  Kouyou felt his smile soften and something feel light in his small chest.

He bumped his shoulder against Yuu’s and watched as their knobby knees knocked together.

“You’re something good, too.”


	2. Age 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thirteen-years-old, it was still awkward; lanky limbs bumping against each other and pink dusting their faces. Preteen breaths became shaky, erratic, as Yuu leaned in close to wipe the red from Kouyou's lips. "Don't tell my mom."

_Age 13_  
  
  
He was seeing spots, flashing colors whizzing past him.  His back was against the grass, eyes snapped open to try and catch each one in his sight.  Blue, orange, yellow -- black, black, _Kouyou._  
  
"What are you doing?"  
  
Yuu blinked, the colors disappearing into the clouds and being replaced by Kouyou's owlish eyes tilted head and crooked smile.  The younger boy leaned over him from the side, shin guards from practice still strapped to his lean calves.  Yuu waited a beat before answering, content to throw a hand up into the air above him and let his fingers attempt to brush the sky.  Kouyou watched.  _Won't you be my sky --_  
  
Yuu's other hand fisted in the grass.  
  
"Teach me."  
  
Like a flickering, fickle comet, Kouyou disappeared from view.  Yuu frowned and sat up, looking off to his right to see the black-haired boy crinkle his brow at him.  He was squinting slightly from the afternoon sun that the clouds had refused to hold back.  Yuu watched how his teeth fiddled with his bottom lip in confusion.  Something, that same _something_ that often plagued him these days, fluttered in his chest.   
  
Kouyou let go of his lip, “Teach you what?”  
  
Yuu sat up more, decision already steadfast in his mind.  His hands twitched at the thought of _doing_ something, _grabbing_ something, _twisting into Kouyou’s hair because it always looked so tousled and soft from blazing away in this wind and he had always wanted to –_    
Yuu stopped.  His eyes widened and he snapped his blushing visage away from Kouyou’s now concerned gaze.  
  
He blurted, "Soccer."  _Everything._  
  
And it was the first time (certainly not the last time) that Kouyou merely nodded his head and said yes.  
  
&&  
  
Yuu's mother began to think her son had a girlfriend.  It was thirteen years too early for her tastes, but she couldn't pinpoint any other reason as to why the aloof preteen would now suddenly race out the door, leave for hours on end, only to return with grass stains on his back.  
  
She frowned with the small, gray shirt in her hands.  The washing machine sat idle, ready and waiting, as she turned the fabric over and over.  Emerald streaks splattered across every inch of its surface.  
  
A sigh escaped her.  
  
&&  
  
"Yuu~!  We _can't_ play now!"  
  
Yuu turned around roughly, Kouyou's dainty wrist still in his clutches as he dragged him off to their designated 'spot', "And why not?"  
  
Kouyou set his sights to the ground, nibbling at his lip like he always did whenever Yuu would regard him like _that_ \-- frustrated, happy, angry, peaceful, content, _everything_.  The younger boy looked up, his hunched posture making the normally taller boy short in comparison to Yuu's confident stride.  
  
"Coach'll get mad."  
  
"Do you always do what others tell you to?"  
  
"I do what you tell me to."  
  
Yuu paused and looked at Kouyou, eyebrow raised.  The black-haired soccer player was gazing unto him with honesty radiating bright in his eyes.  Preteen innocence in all its sacred scarcity.  Suddenly, the boy's wrist felt so delicate.  Fragile.  He could squeeze it, tug too hard and snap it to pieces if he wasn't careful.  It didn't matter that the other was stronger than him most days -- pinning him easily to the ground when he got out of hand.  
  
He didn't want to break Kouyou.  
  
He let go of his wrist.  
  
His fingers felt cold so he crossed his arms tightly across his chest, "You shouldn't."  
  
Kouyou lamented the heat gone from his skin, but stepped closer to Yuu just in case he ran away ( _because Akira had run away_ ), "What if I want to?"  
  
Yuu watched wearily as Kouyou padded closer, cleats digging into the dirt and rooting him there.  Permanent holes burned into the ground.  _We were here._  
  
But Yuu knew that Kouyou wouldn't always stay, because so many people had already left.  Yuu uncrossed his arms and frowned, "Don't listen to me, Kouyou."  
  
Yuu turned away before his eyes betrayed him and watched the younger boy's face fall.  Watched those perfect-imperfect lips part in horror that _Yuu would just leave-leave-leave._  
  
He got as far as the fallen log he and Kouyou had deemed as their 'safe spot' for tag before he heard swift footsteps behind him.  
  
Yuu whipped around, anger igniting in his ebony eyes at the fact that the sound made his heart _so hopeful_ , "What are you doing."  
  
And Kouyou merely smiled, sky echoing in his grin, "Not listening."  
  
And then he ran ahead, past the stunned and speechless Yuu whose spitfire had been effectively snuffed out, and towards the abandoned clearing that both had deemed 'the spot'.  
  
And Yuu ran after him.  
  
Lungs crackling against embers, Kouyou turned around, beaming brightly when he saw Yuu scramble towards him.  With a mischievous glint flashing in his chocolate eyes, the taller boy pumped his legs faster, years of soccer letting him fly, fly, fly.  
  
 _"I always wanted to be a bird."  Yuu glanced up from the encyclopedia they had stolen from Kouyou's dad.  They had wanted to look up 'lolly water'.  
  
_ Kouyou was almost a dot in the distance as Yuu felt his calves burn and esophagus dry up.  He could hear his laughter, something that reminded him almost of home, almost of the moon.  He didn't know why.  
  
 _"A bird?  I don't like birds."  
  
_ The trees parted and Yuu burst from the thorny shrubs that nipped at his bare legs, into the clearing.  He licked his lips, absently deciding he'd steal Kouyou's water bottle when it stopped feeling like his feet were going to fall off.  Sweat lapped at his skin, lithe fingers that were slowly becoming sharp and defined pushed his growing, raven locks from his forehead.  A giggle tore his eyes away from the spinning ground to the willowy figure standing haughtily in the distance.  Mid-afternoon light billowed around him, casting off a dreadful illusion of ethereal wonder.  And Yuu found himself enraptured.  
  
 _Kouyou lolled his head towards him, hitting his shoulder and letting his locks splay across the older's t-shirt, "Why not?"  
  
_ Kouyou only kept smiling, eyes still laughing, as he slowly walked toward the panting Yuu.  He was glistening from sweat as well, the hot summer day making his shirt stick and his heart race.  Close enough to almost shake hands, Kouyou finally straightened his spine to his full height and peered down at Yuu.    
  
The smile slowly lifted into a playful smirk.  
  
Yuu chuckled lowly before he pounced.  
  
 _Yuu bit his lip, a rare show of vulnerability that Kouyou didn't fail to miss, and murmured softly, "They always run away."  
  
_ Kouyou gasped as his back hit the ground.  He could feel Yuu's elbow in his stomach, the other's legs intertwining with his own as they rolled around in the grass like they were nine again.  The elder couldn't bite back his smile as he pinned the other beneath him, hips ground into the boy's narrow waist.  
  
Grass stained knees knocked together.  
  
Kouyou's frantic breath was slowly calming as they lay there, a soft fanning upon his neck.  He could feel the wet t-shirt against his palms.  It was disgusting and beautiful.  
  
Yuu closed his eyes and leaned in.   
  
 _The book in his hands was getting heavier.  Something prickly was making his eyes water.  
  
_ Their foreheads locked together, connected in the tousled grass.  Yuu's fingers felt numb.  Kouyou's hair was soft and _right_ , just like he always thought.  
  
 _Kouyou politely ignored the clear rivulets staining Yuu's cheeks and merely drawled out with a gentle smile, "But if I was a bird, I'd take you with me."_  
  
&&  
  
Kouyou had always looked so pretty in red.  
  
The thought made Yuu embarrassingly avert his gaze to his fidgeting hands.  He dragged his thumb along his right knuckle, pretending they were bowed lips.  His brow furrowed.  
  
Was it okay like this?  To pine and feel _light_ when that slightly ditzy, always gentle boy briefly touched his shoulder, if only to prattle on about the newest video game he possessed?  Or when he laughed so hard that his head would collapse into the hollow of Yuu's neck.  Was it okay to want to keep him there, keep them both suspended in space with starlight being the only thing that could touch them?  Protect him and embrace him like those foreign movies depicted that they had watched together in stilted silence?  
  
Yuu fidgeted some more, squirming on the park bench as the girl from his grade quickly bowed in front of him and hurried in the opposite direction, cheeks burning.  The pink carnation lay crumpled in his lap.  _"I like you -- please like me back, Shiroyama-kun!"_  
  
The raven-haired boy plucked a roseate petal and watched it flutter meekly to the cement below.  
  
He liked red better.  
  
&&  
  
Kouyou's lips were red.  
  
Vermillion was splashed on them, dribbling towards his chin, and Yuu couldn't stop shaking.  
  
"It's not that bad..."  
  
The elder boy watched how his hand trembled, how Kouyou was placing his fingers onto of the pallid digits in a feeble attempt to soothe.  But his face was all torn up, all broken and sticky with crimson.    
  
They were crumpled against the brick building of Kouyou's middle school.  The younger was panting slightly, the bruises from the older boys who had encircled him were still pulsing.  He wanted to lean against Yuu's chest, drown out the throb with Yuu's heart.  
  
But he wouldn't ask.  
  
Yuu seethed silently, remembering the grotesque scene of Kouyou on the ground as one of the brutes tried to kick in his teeth.  How the twelve-and-a-half year-old hadn't screamed.  How he wasn't fast enough.  How he was late in meeting Kouyou in the first place -- the plastic bag filled with bird feathers was left stranded somewhere to their left, dropped in haste.  
  
Kouyou had his head lowered as he sat against the wall, watching how the blood was dripping from somewhere _in_ him to the pavement.  Gray steadily became specked, an ugly Picasso tragedy that made bile churn in Yuu's throat.  
  
He found himself tilting Kouyou's head up, thumb and forefinger softly pressing into his chin.  Kouyou's lips parted as they tried to breathe, slathered with red like lipstick smears.  
  
Kouyou poked his tongue out, tried to lap up the excess before wheezing, "They said they didn't like my mouth.  That is was ugly... and weird."  
  
Yuu didn't say anything, just watched as Kouyou's matted hair slid to sweep into his eyes.  He counted each scratch and purple splotch that dappled across his once-milky flesh.  
  
"They said they were going to fix it."  
  
Yuu just stared at Kouyou's misshapen lips, swollen and twisted into a wry smile, "Am I pretty now, Yuu?"  
  
The shorter boy blinked, let his thumb slide along Kouyou's jaw and wipe away the scarlet that dared to touch his smile --  
  
"You'll always be beautiful."  
  
The smile broke and the tears leaked from those desolate, brown eyes.  Yuu let him bury his face into his white school uniform, despising how his own ebony irises were starting to become wet with hate.  He could feel each sob reverberate from Kouyou's ribs to his own.  Red streaked across his ivory shirt and Yuu tangled his fingers into those night-sky tresses.  
  
 _"I'll take care of you.  'Promise."  
  
_ Kouyou's bathroom was small and cramped, Yuu decided as he banged his elbow into the poorly placed cabinet yet again, trying to retrieve any sort of adhesive.  Letting his legs dangle idly, the taller boy sat upon the counter, hands gripping its marble edges tight.  Yuu didn't comment on his white knuckles or quivering arms.  Rather, he silently righted himself in front of the other and began to gently apply the ointment he found deep within the vanity.  
  
Kouyou's sunlight was gone, only bare traces of stardust visible in the dim, flickering light above them.  Yuu's fingers were trembling as he caressed each part of Kouyou's bruised skin.  Delicate, shattered.  The fire inside his veins was starting to lick his heart, black taking over his dark, brown eyes.  _He didn't like feeling useless.  
  
_ It was still awkward; lanky limbs bumping against each other and pink dusting their faces.  Preteen breaths became shaky, erratic, as Yuu leaned in close to wipe away the red from Kouyou's lips.  
  
A soft utterance, "Don't tell my mom."  
  
Yuu paused, tearing his eyes away from Kouyou's red staining his fingertips to the boy's nervous gaze.  His face was still swelled, agony painting lovely rivers against his cheeks.  He went to go and bite his lip, that endearing habit whenever Yuu _looked at him_ like that, but he stopped, remembering the ache in his mouth.  
  
In that moment of helplessness, where they were crouched in the bathroom with the door locked, plastic bag of feathers strewn across the floor, Yuu put his hand on Kouyou's knee.  
  
He clutched it with vigor, a promise of something beautiful encased in the touch.  
  
And Kouyou couldn't help but to edge closer, placing his forehead against Yuu's.  
  
Their staggering breaths mingled.  Yuu's wide eyes refused to close -- reaping in the gift of having this being so _near_.  His nose touched Kouyou's right cheek, felt small hands grip at his shirt, as he heard the other murmur, "Don't tell her, please don't tell her..."  
  
Yuu merely tried to get closer, to wrap Kouyou into his own being.  Shield him, protect him and make him warm when his bones were so horribly cold.  He wanted to press those damn feather he collected (for him) into the broken boy's shoulder blades.  He wanted to tape them tight and tell him to _fly and be free and get away from this world._  
  
But before he had a chance, Kouyou let out a choked sob, "Sometimes...just sometimes, I wish I had never been born at all -- "  
  
Yuu dug his fingernails into Kouyou's knee, leaving his own red bruise as he bit out with venom, "Don't you ever fucking say that."  
  
Kouyou lifted his head from the elder boy's and looked at him with disbelieving eyes.  They were round and smudged with tears.  Their innocence was crumbling.  
  
"You said a curse word."  
  
"You said you wanted to die."  
  
"I said only sometimes I do."  
  
Angered, Yuu jerkily pulled back, ending contact, "It doesn't _matter_ if it's sometimes.  'Sometimes' always turns into 'always'."  
  
Kouyou shivered, cold from the drying blood on his body and wrinkled his brow.  Yuu seethed before him, blindly furious and claws unsheathed.  His longer hair was wild, a lion's mane tangled around his face.  His ebony eyes glared over at him and Kouyou tiled his head, whispering:  
  
"Then, what if sometimes I love you?"  
  
The stark sound of the bathroom door slamming shook Kouyou's spine.  
  
&&  
  
It was two days after the incident in the bathroom when Kouyou spotted Yuu waiting for him outside his school.  He could still detect some burnt pink tracing his translucent white shirt and Kouyou wondered if Yuu had worn it today on purpose.  He jogged over, almost tripping over his excited feet, bruised lips pulling into an elated grin.  
  
Though, when Yuu was just a few steps away and in clear view, Kouyou paused.  His smile faltered and his heart began to crack.  
  
But Yuu smiled, really smiled, so bright that Kouyou thought maybe he was looking straight at the blushing moon.  The bruised, blackened eye twinkled just as strongly as Yuu's other untouched one.  The taller boy peered down minutely to see the other's scraped knuckles at his sides.  
  
Yuu held them up, displaying the torn skin with pride.  
  
"We match now, okay?"  
  
&&  
  
Later, when the bruises fade and Kouyou's imperfect lips are "perfect" once again, Yuu challenges him to a race.  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Don't always question everything, weirdo."  
  
The fall air feels crisp in his lungs as Yuu barrels forward.  But really, he's watching Kouyou's back, watching how his hair is like black ribbons streaking in the wind.  It's almost too quick for his eyes.  
  
But wasn't everything that was _worth_ everything too quick to capture?  
  
Sweat clings to his shirt and he absently realizes that they never declared a finish line.  
  
Kouyou looks back at him and laughs.  
  
For a second, his smile was the sun.  
  
 _I will catch you one day._


	3. Age 19

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nineteen-years-old, he tried to step away -- tried to catch his falling heart because for some inane reason, in this moment of dirty alleys and smearing kohl, he thought of Kouyou.

_Age 19  
  
_ _  
  
"What do you want to be when you grow up?"  
  
Kouyou's head was on his stomach, counting Yuu's breaths as the sun winked at them through the clouds.  Yuu reached out and touched the black tresses that fanned out across his chest._  
  
 _"Something unforgettable."  
  
"Will you forget me?"  
  
Yuu pulled his hand back, something in his chest starting to falter.  He didn't fail to notice how Kouyou knew it wouldn't always be like this -- so close to his ribs, cheek rubbing against his navel.  The world _**_hurt_** _.  And they would disappear._  
  
He had the sudden urge to hold-on-tight because he couldn't promise Kouyou the world, the sky, his heart.  'Forever' was a lie that would burn his teeth.  He couldn't.  
  
But he did.  
  
"Never."  
  
&&  
  
Broken stars were in his mouth.  Something crisped and burnt, like charcoal licking his tongue.  Cinders from homeless cigarettes ground beneath his boots and Aoi tried not to imagine how he could start a fire right here – burn inside out and ravage and blaze.  It was three AM and despite wondrous air pollution, Tokyo wasn’t bright enough to cast light upon the shadows painted beneath his eyes. 

He hadn’t seen the sun in six years.

Aoi grasped the cigarette between his fingers tighter because it was okay. 

It was still okay even when his ribs started to poke through his skin.

When his calluses from disastrous riffs split open.

When he stood over the sink and watched the vermillion hair dye splatter across the porcelain like a homespun tragedy.  When he peered into the mirror and his hair was blood; dried and dead. 

Aoi had always loved red.

&&

_“If you look closely,” Kouyou whispers next to him on the ferris wheel, shoulder bumping against his own, “You can see the whole world from here.”_

_Yuu doesn’t believe a word of it, but so help him he looks anyway._

_But even as he’s looking out over the entire world, he finds himself being drawn back to the lithe frame by his side.  He watches Kouyou watch the world._

_And he realizes, with his hand edging toward those pale fingers, that the other might just be his universe._

&&

He had left.  Starlit billboards at his back, nothing but his sleeping pills and guitar, he burst from the gates and ran, ran, until he could no longer picture _his smile_ so achingly perfect.

Aoi never promised he would stay.

And suddenly he was incinerating his lungs with ashes, biting lips of prostitutes that would give him food if he gave them 80 yen.  Night seemed to be safe, a place he could hide his bruised eyes and thinning figure.  Where he could forget the sun and its warmth because his bones were too cold now to ever create heat. 

“What’s that on your lip?”

Aoi glanced briefly to his left, unconsciously roving his tongue over the metal adorning the aforementioned flesh.  Eyes flooded with ebony, he softly uttered, “Just another hole in me.”

The other young man raised an eyebrow before leaning against the amp the elder was working on, skeleton-fingers pale and shaking, “C’mon, what is it?  Something that everyone will _worship_ you for?  What’ll get those sluts to suck your _fucking huge_ _co_ –”

“Shut the _fuck_ up _,_ Yune.”

Yune snapped his mouth shut, seeing that Aoi’s jaw was clenching, black irises blazing and lip curled.  Taking a cautious step away from the amp, the younger man rolled his eyes.  It was always like this.  Aoi had been sharp and angled ever since he met him, tongue forked and ready to bite, “You really need to control that temper, Aoi-kun.”

Aoi only snorted roughly, already turned away.  His shoulder blades were sharp points under his brown sweater, daggers that moved elegantly with each flick of his fingers against the tuner.  Yune wondered as he watched the wool fabric ride up his bandmate’s back, eyes roving over each knob of his spine:

“Do you ever eat?”

“I needed that new amp.”

Yune furrowed his brow, short mop swaying to the right as he tilted his head, “What does that have to do with anything?”

Aoi never looked up from his work, voice cold and back glaring, “Rent, food, new amp.  You can only pick two.” 

The moon outside the smudged window briefly caught the glint of his lip ring, almost swallowing him whole with light.  But Aoi was beautiful darkness, arctic heart tangled firmly in barbed wire because he couldn’t _make things right, sorry mom_ and people had left him.  And he broke promises.

And Kouyou wasn’t here.

Aoi stuffed the cigarette in his mouth and bit down on it hard, tobacco becoming crushed and fire so close to his gums.  He dug his fingers into copper strings and let ashes soak his mouth.

&&

_“You shouldn’t smoke.”_

_“You shouldn’t be so innocent.”_

&&

Aoi let the instrument fall, watched how the fiberglass ripping apart seemed like glistening shards of suicide-stars. 

The imprint of the missed chord was still on his palm, the faulty wire that was tugged out of his guitar by the clumsy vocalist was grounded beneath his combat boots as he stalked off the stage.  He let his lungs die in that moment, savored the blood in his mouth as he bit his cheek clean-through from holding back a guttural scream.  His eyes screamed instead, noir abysses that refused to shut even in those nights of _what if I had been safer, what if I was still Yuu?_

The band sucked, the audience was nil and the live house was too dim and dark to see the frets right.  He ignored Yune’s frantic calls to _get the fuck back here, what are you doing!?_

_Stopping; I don’t know, maybe being unforgettable –_

But he didn’t turn around, didn’t assure the frazzled man with sweet-nothings.  He merely left, walked off as his guitar lay in pieces.

He didn’t feel the blood running down his hands until he stepped into the chilled air outside.  The slices on his knuckles were a memory of when the strings had snapped; glistening knives whipping against his skin.  He regarded the rivulets apathetically before wiping the sticky substance on the bottom of his jacket.  Breathing shakily and eyes still caked with heavy kohl, Aoi tried to extricate that morbid feeling of being raw.  Tried to stop feeling so damn _useless and used_. 

He wanted to reach deep down inside of himself and rip himself apart.

Lighting a cigarette, he stalked off into the nearest alleyway and allowed his thin body to lean against the olden brick.  The white stick was becoming stained with rust-colored blood, but Aoi, closing his eyes, couldn’t help but to think the grotesque feeling of his soul against his fingers was somehow beautiful.

&&

_“Is it okay like this?”_

_Kouyou was gazing unto him like he was the one who would save them both.  Yuu couldn’t look him in the eye, couldn’t keep his knees from shaking when the taller teen touched the dip of his hipbone._

_“I’m going to break us, Kou.”_

_Kouyou blinked, eyelashes sweeping against his sockets for the briefest of seconds – something uncatchable, butterfly sighs and moonlit creeds.  His fingers kept caressing the elder’s flesh, slowly moving towards the concave shell of his heart.  “So it’s not okay?”_

_Yuu cocked his chin upwards from where he laid on his back, shoulder blades digging into willow tree roots.  Kouyou was slathered atop him, long legs intertwined with the hollows of his knees.  The tips of his black locks were tickling his neck, soft whispers for the fickle promise of ‘forever, now’._

_Yuu bit his lip, dark brown eyes lit with something akin to devastating foresight, “It won’t be okay.”_

_“Even if I’m careful?”_

_Kouyou’s hands were on his face, gentle fingertips now touching his cheekbones.  They cradled him as if he were precious.  It made Yuu’s stomach churn and ribs weep because he **knew** –_

_“It won’t be your fault.”_

_“It won’t be like that, Yuu.”_

_“Fuck, Kouyou.  Won’t you believe me for just one second?”_

_“I won’t believe you’ll hurt me.  You promised you’d take care of me and I know you’ll keep it because you’re something good, remember?”_

_Yuu let Kouyou trace his thumb along his jaw, let his lips whisper the words against his skin, “It’ll be okay.”_

_He couldn’t stop himself from murmuring back, “It won’t, it won’t, I’m going to tear us apart” – voice broken and a sob sinking its claws into his chest._

_But Kouyou merely smiled, wove his fingers into Yuu’s raven hair and pressed his nose into the side of his cheek._

_“How can you tear me apart when you’re what keeps me together?”_

&&

“Well, _that_ was a fucking spectacle.”

Aoi jerked his head up from gazing at the wet pavement, cigarette still clutched between his lips and scarlet hair sticking to the side of his face.  He could feel the kohl start to drip from his eyes, but the rhythm guitarist paid no heed – suddenly faced with the dilapidated figure a couple feet away.

The stranger smiled at him, amused and maybe a tad delirious as he stepped closer.  The shadows ebbed from his body, revealing the tall and malnourished form in all its glory.  Hair like spindles of gold, yet limp and forgotten, lapped at his jutting collarbone and Aoi found himself entranced with how it still caught even the faintest of light – shining. 

He was obviously a fellow player at the live house with the makeup that was streaking across his slightly feminine face.  That, Aoi absently surmised, or he was a prostitute.  The shorter man surveyed the tight tank top, leather skirt and high, checkered socks with a mild air of awed curiosity.  The stranger’s broad shoulders dispelled any illusion to his gender, but the way his pillow-lips pouted and his lithe fingers caressed a cigarette made Aoi believe – for just the slightest of seconds – that he was beautiful.

Watching how the taller man’s navy eye-shadow began to run, the powdered sparkle licking at his cheekbones, Aoi felt a smirk work at his stern mouth, “ _I’m_ the fucking spectacle, eh?”

The eccentric-dressing man smiled wider, a light flickering into his eyes and suddenly he seemed _alive_ , “Given the way you made mince-meat out of your guitar and abandoned the sinking ship of crap on stage without a word, I’d say yes.”

When the man lifts his hand to take another lungful of nicotine, Aoi sees the track-marks criss-crossing along the inside of his arm.  The flesh was slathered in sickening shades of black and blue punctures, and Aoi felt the twinge of desire to connect them all ( _try and make sense as to **why**_ ).  When the blonde shook his head, smile now bitter as he spotted Aoi’s staring, Aoi saw starlight in his hair despite the gauntness of his face.

_Because the world has always been ‘starve-for-glory’._

He paused to breathe out a wisp of smoke before slurring, “I don’t think that’s really you up there, you know.”

He glanced at Aoi, honey irises warming, “But, you need some patience, sir.”

The casual words snapped Aoi out of his trance, ignited the flames that always lurked inside his being.  He clenched his hands at his sides as he narrowed his eyes.  It was irrational and foolhardy and proving the man’s point, but _fuck_ , Aoi just wanted to feel _something, anything._

The leather-skirted young man swiveled his eyes towards Aoi’s shaking fists before looking him straight into the abyss of his glare, “You don’t want to fight.”

The sound of the blonde’s back hitting the brick wall was _beautiful and sick and wrong and right._   Aoi tightened his grip of the man’s collar, fingernails sinking into the pallid skin beneath.  He leaned in close, baring his teeth and wondering why this felt _chaotic and perfect._

The fist nearest to the man’s heart buried into his shirt with white knuckles, “Nothing’s stopping me from putting this fist through your mouth.”

But rather than fear or shock or anger, the flaxen-haired man licked his lips, pouty and plush, “ ‘Rather it was your tongue instead.”

Aoi’s eyes widened from their narrowed glower, something tightening in his stomach, before ferocity made him lash out, slamming the willowy figure against the wall.  He could hear each bone rattle.  The stranger lifted a hand to grasp at Aoi’s wrist in a silent plea.  Splotched track-marks rubbed against him and Aoi took in the mussed hair, the battered gaze, the glossed lips and sneered.

“Except for the fact that you look like a fucking whore.”

And with a courage Aoi never knew existed, the man released his wrist to calmly twine a lock of Aoi’s rust-colored hair around his finger.  Regarding the shorter man intently, he then leaned in and practically purred against his jaw, “Then what’s stopping you from kissing me?”

Aoi jerked his head to the left, suddenly too close.  His hands were beginning to loosen and tremble.  But the man never moved away, rather, he tugged the lock of hair and grazed a knee against Aoi’s thigh, “What’s the matter?” 

His voice was deep, husky in a way that wasn’t like the prostitutes dancing beneath the lampposts – more like a promise, more like a lover.  Aoi tried to step away, tried to catch his falling heart because for some inane reason, in this moment of dirty alleys and smearing kohl, he thought of Kouyou.

The taller man’s eyes softened, “Who do you want me to be tonight?”

Aoi shut his eyes tight, blocked out the starlight that was falling gently from this man and growled through gritted teeth, “I don’t want your name.”

He blindly reached out with his callused hand and roughly grabbed the man’s chin, fingertips bruising the jaw.  His maw was almost upon those pursed lips, he felt the leather fabric caressing the front of his frayed jeans and the moon was becoming shadowed by the clouds.

Before he had a chance to force their bodies together, drown himself and escape, the stranger spoke against his mouth, “Then call me Uruha.  I need to give you _something_ to moan.”

He crashed their mouths together then, all biting and teeth and crimson.  It felt horrible, wonderful, and Aoi only wanted to sink in deeper.  He clawed at Uruha’s back, fingers finding each dip in his spine – he counted the vertebrae and sucked on that lip until the other pushed a leg between his own.

_Get ready for this._

And now it was a zephyr of slammed wrists and bruised cheeks; Uruha clung to the wall with desperate hands.  The mumble of _‘hurry, hurry’_ and the anxious tug of committing sins before the sun wakes overtook any rational sense.  The blonde shifted impatiently as a foreign weight pushed against his chest, he couldn’t breathe between the pants and hisses of _‘but just wait – ’_

The dim light filtered in a plethora of devil-shadows, painting purple bruises under Aoi’s black eyes.  The pupils had stretched and the grip upon Uruha’s wrists was becoming too tight to bear without protest.  There was an impatient grunt as hips slammed together. 

Like they had no time. 

He touched his lips to each puncture-bruise on Uruha’s skin.

 _‘Forever’_ wasn’t waiting.

&&

_“Will I ever be like them, Yuu?”_

_Eleven-years-old, Yuu dabbed the new split lip with a soft cotton ball, watching Kouyou closely._

_“Like who?”_

_Kouyou swallowed, honey irises flashing with doubt, “Like the people that beat me up, or the people that just watch.”_

_Yuu stops cleaning the corner of Kouyou’s mouth and presses a gentle hand to his cheek.  Kouyou edges closer to the touch, knowing that somehow this will change everything._

_Yuu’s eyes are hard and determined, voice unwavering as he promises, “No, you’ll always be good.”_

&&

He doesn’t give Uruha his number, but he gives him his address.  It was an awkward statement, cumbersome and loose in his mouth as Uruha lapped the cream-lathered seed from his lips – sore and rouge.  But the taller man memorized it, repeated it, because he didn’t want to lose contact ( _any contact, flesh-on-flesh-and-maybe-heart-upon-heart_ ). 

His knees are scraped from when he fell upon them, so eager to please and be accepted and _maybe, just maybe lo—_

He walked away shakily, and Aoi could see how his tall frame was broad, masculine despite the skirt and the lipstick.  Something Aoi wanted to fall into, lean against.    

Uruha disappeared, vanished from the entire world, for three days.

Aoi leaves the light on each and every night.  He wasn’t sure why.  Maybe something to do with how he could still detect the touch of the blonde’s mouth against his neck.  Or something about the way his eyes shined so damn bright.

Maybe.

And when Uruha did show up – in full color, reality slapped against his chest – Aoi almost wishes he hadn’t.

Because those track-marks were bleeding and fresh.  Eyes glazed and smile slurred, Uruha leant against his doorframe like a drunken feline, declawed and willing. 

“You’re one fucking hard guy to forget.”

“Sorry.”  Because he was.

Uruha snorted and slid his eyes to the floorboards beneath him.  Aoi noted the ripped jeans, the gossamer jacket and threadbare band shirt proclaiming ‘SEX PISTOLS’.  He had half a mind to ask where the checkered socks went.  Instead, he stepped aside and observed Uruha shakily bustle inside his apartment.  He moved with all the grace of a decadent comet – flickering, fading, barely there but then suddenly so vivid that it blinded the whole sky. 

Uruha flopped onto his futon, the decrepit thing sitting out-of-place in his living-dining-everything room.  The taller man lackadaisically tangled himself in the used sheets, face buried in his pillow and socked feet poking through the quilt. 

Arm thrown over his face, bleeding holes thrust in Aoi’s direction, Uruha sighed. 

And Aoi couldn’t help but blurt, “You shouldn’t do that.”

Uruha peeked from under his arm with a wry grin, “I shouldn’t have done a lot of things.  But I like being broken apart.”

He rolled over, letting his hand fall to the cracked floorboards, and face tilted upwards like he could feel the sun from Aoi’s fluorescent light, “Ripped wide open.”

Aoi crossed his arms tight.  Uruha closed his eyes, staying perfectly still except for the slight twitch of his callused fingers.  The one-room apartment stopped breathing.  And for a split moment, they didn’t exist.

But then Uruha opened his eyes, caramel irises swiveling towards Aoi’s guarded expression, “Sometimes it hurts to feel whole.”

Aoi turned away, hugging himself tighter.  The crooked clock on his wall declared it was 2:47am.

He heard his voice softly utter, “Why did you come here?”

“I couldn’t sleep.”

“Now the real reason.”

“Why do you think I’d lie?”

“Because I lie.”

Uruha sat up, off-balance and swaying.  His legs were still strangled by Aoi’s sheets.  Blue constrictors capturing and keeping him here, on this earth, for just a while more.  His eyes were hard suddenly, caramel frozen over as he stared into Aoi’s black orbs.

“I’m nineteen, a runaway, a guitar player, a user.  I left home after I lost everything.  I thought I might find something here, but all I’ve got so far is an addiction with self-destruction and I think I might like it.”

Uruha leaned in, hands now digging into the sheets pooled in his lap, “When you destroyed your guitar, I wanted to fuck you.  When you slammed me into the wall, I wanted to love you.”

The younger man closed his eyes again, tongue running over his lips as if parched before he breathed out, “That’s the truth.  Everything.”

Something was waiting inside Aoi’s heart as he found himself softly saying, “You said you lost everything.  Who was it?”

Not _what_ because Aoi knew of the same agony that slipped into Uruha’s eyes as he spoke it. 

Uruha kept his eyes closed, lazily tracing the marks on the inside of his arm with a hand.  Gnarled fingertips, obvious years from ripping out chords, travelled up, up, down.  They mingled with each chaste kiss of death and Aoi began to think he wouldn’t answer.

He surprised him when he suddenly uttered, “Think of the universe.  The world.  Your world.  Your half.  Your heart.”

Uruha opened his eyes and Aoi was caught inside their torture –

“That’s who it was.”

Aoi was silent, his hand absently coming up to clutch at his quivering heart because something was rattling inside him.  He might be shattering, but this perfect mess atop his futon might be the one to tell him _it’s okay, come fall apart with me._

“Uruha.”

The flaxen-haired man tilted his head, waiting.

Aoi swallowed, “My name.  I never told you -- ”

Uruha smiled, lips quirking to one side, “Don’t tell me.”

He couldn’t stop the knife of rejection from carving into him, “Why?”

Uruha was like black starlight, blocking out the moon and spread across his sheets, “Because you don’t know who you are yet.”

He then laid back down, splayed his arms across the mattress.  His eyes were still glazed, a drowning caramel, and his lips puckered, “So tell me who you are tonight.”

He felt compelled, pulled in, suffocated and absolutely perfect, “Aoi.”


	4. Age 23

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tawny hair now splayed across each cerulean stitch of the comforter, Uruha watched Aoi pause -- as if to regard how the lead guitarist always did fit so well into the sky. Almost a sun.

_Age 23_

  
  
There was a soft hand upon his jaw, the tired calluses of long-nights-passed tracing his hot skin.  It was like there was no time, and Uruha was compelled to take a quick downward peek at the fingers that began to hold his face as if something had just leapt from the precarious cusp they had created.

He swallowed lightly and imagined how Aoi’s countenance had become almost like silk, warm eyes drinking him greedily – and Uruha knew that his pale hair was mussed from the shower he took two hours ago, that he had no makeup ( _nowhere to hide_ ) swept on his eyes.  But Aoi didn’t seem to notice, even when he was still dabbled with eyeshadow and other false promises, as the rough fingertips almost melted with each stroke.  It was a slow progression, one that had Uruha shutting his eyes tight and Aoi touching his forehead against the other’s. 

“Watch me.”  Each word kissed his eyelids, the tepid breath of the elder tickling his nose.  Uruha let a soft breath sigh from his plush lips, and nudged his head forward until those blackbird strands touched his cheek.

He almost reached out to clutch those hands tight, hold onto _this_ because Aoi was fifty different men crammed into one face.  He was the artist, the lover, the dork, the sex god, the home-wrecker, the brother, the workaholic, the dreamer.  And with those souls shifting endlessly within those enigmatic irises, Uruha kissed each one shut.

A forefinger and thumb pinched his chin and slowly lifted his idle face until his eyes finally flickered towards Aoi’s soft smirk, “ _Watch_ me, Uruha.”

And Uruha felt a little spiteful tonight, a night of gray-sky canvases and fading moons, so he playfully scoffed before swiveling his gaze towards his bedroom door.

Aoi had never taken too kindly to outright snubbing.

So he was propelled  through the stale air of a musky apartment towards the very bedroom door used in his foul attempt at gaining an upper-hand.  The elder man’s grip upon his arm was almost harmonious with the light touch to the small of his back – pushing with no force, but all his might.  The cream walls bleared and the world tilted as he was unceremoniously dropped onto the navy comforter that was ridden with gossamer apologies.  Tawny hair now splayed across each cerulean stitch, Uruha watched Aoi pause – as if to regard how the lead guitarist always did fit so well into the sky.

Almost a sun.

Almost too distant to touch; made his eyes water and skin warm.

The raven-haired rhythm guitarist suddenly stepped out of Uruha’s makeshift aerial view.  Curious, the doe-eyed man sat up to find Aoi standing a couple feet across from him as if waiting.  The air felt like glitter across his skin, blistering each inkling of defiance inside his ribs.  Raising an eyebrow, Uruha smiled softly at the endearing scene of his band mate fidgeting with his hands, bringing those sinewy fingers up to his chest as he stared directly into the other’s eyes.  Uruha could feel a pulse beneath his lip and this preamble – and he leaned in with insatiable interest.

“Watch,” Aoi whispered then, full lips barely moving but his eyes shining with each soul that burned through him, “Watch me dance, Uruha.” 

Uruha swiped his tongue across his bottom lip, the chapped skin burning and the soft command fists his heart tight.  He couldn’t help but murmur with a quirk of a grin, despite how Aoi was edging closer with celestial steps –

 _“Why should I?_ ”

It was his first words of the evening and Aoi only ran a hand through his silken locks, black night swallowing those alabaster knuckles deep, as a hip cocked to one side.  There was a faint smile lingering upon his lips and Uruha could see those eyelids flutter shut – and he knew he’s asked for it, begged for it with that flimsy sentence where each vowel of _want_ had dropped into Aoi’s awaiting palms.

Aoi’s hand slowly slid from its noir entrapment, releasing a few strands to caress his cheek before he let it trail down to his taut abdomen.  His eyes opened languidly, nails still caressing flushed skin, “That’s my line, Uru-chan.”

And then he danced.

Those sensuous hips loll in broken figure-eights, hands now tracing up his sides to brush his shirt aside and Uruha felt his mouth part slowly.  Head falling to the left, as if such ministrations were draining, Aoi hid his face in a curtain of black before he arched his back in an impossible bridge that left his throat exposed. 

The world seemed to shudder, night flickering to reveal the sun for the briefest of moments before Aoi snapped back to lean forward with predator eyes. 

Each step towards Uruha’s being was filled with delicious tempo and melody, the sway of each breath capturing the guitarist in rolls of  
tempests that blazed and burned.  What made Aoi that mysterious deity upon the stage slid its way toward him, and Uruha did the only thing he could do as Aoi finally grasped his knees in a grip that compelled him to gasp.

He _watched_.

Aoi slinked his way to Uruha’s lap, forced the taller man to lean back slightly as his nose pressed against his own. 

Aoi then pressed his lips to the edge of Uruha’s jaw, “This is the part where we fall.”

Uruha whispered, “As long as you catch me.”

  
&&

  
His heart was full.  He felt top-heavy and inside the overflow of his aorta, Aoi still felt anxiety lap at his skin.  Because he had messed up before, he had left before, he broke a heart before –

“You’re thinking again.”

Uruha smirked at him from beneath the elder’s arm.  He placed a finger on his nose, the blond-haired man’s mouth lifting into a full grin.  They were lying on a motel bed, the sounds of Kai and Reita practicing beats next door for the concert tomorrow creating a pulse in their chests.  Their legs were tangled together, Uruha having grabbed his waist and pulling him into bed – _“It’s only 5 o’clock”  “I never really cared for time.”_ – sinking into the ratty covers that accidentally marred the younger’s makeup. 

Aoi smiled back, reaching out and smearing the corner of Uruha’s remaining blue eye shadow with a fingertip, “One of us has to.”

Uruha wrinkled his nose to that, sliding his finger from Aoi’s nose to his jaw.  Uruha was always _touch-touch_ – always had to be flush against Aoi like he couldn’t trust his own spine to carry him.  And Aoi always leaned in closer because he was so _cold._  

He shivered and bit his lip as the guitarist slid his gentle finger along the vein in his neck.  Counting each heartbeat – _making sure he was still here._

Cigarette smoke was a haze above their heads and the needle-scars were still visible on the inside of Uruha’s arms.

They weren’t perfect.

They fought hard – Aoi screamed and threw anything he could grasp at the walls, Uruha grit his teeth and whispered black words that twisted in their chests.  They were messy – both pushing, pushing until neither felt the hurt in their lungs.  And they would touch afterwards. 

Just close their eyes and touch each freckle and pore and bone.

  
&&

  
“I don’t know what you’re doing.”

Aoi looks up from his guitar to lift an eyebrow at Reita.  The narrow-shouldered, bleach-haired man is staring at him.  He rolls the cigarette in his fingers back and forth.  Ashes are falling on his shoes and Aoi fights back the urge to point it out.  Reita’s eyes are a dark brown, almost like Aoi’s ebony – guarded and unsure.

Aoi sets the guitar down in his lap and angles his body towards the suddenly-laconic bassist, “Well, I _was_ playing guitar.  See, if I press down here, it’s called a note – ”

“Don’t be a smartass.”

“Well, then don’t say weird things.”

“I’m serious.”

Aoi raised his other eyebrow, exasperated, “About _what_?”

Reita flicked the ashes from his cigarette, a frown marring his usually jovial countenance, “Uruha.  I don’t know what you’re doing, but don’t fucking mess up.”

Aoi scoffed, though his heart faltered, “And who are you to tell me anything?”

Reita’s eyes flashed with spitfire, glare pinning them both in suspension, “His best friend.”

A slow silence ebbed through the room.  Ruki was somewhere outside mostly likely scribbling lyrics in a frenzy from a sprout of inspiration, Kai was in the rented practice room to their right fleshing out his technique and Uruha was on a coffee run.  No one was stepping inside the break room for a good while, and Reita knew it.

The younger man flickered his gaze to his cigarette, “He’s strong, but he’s held up by loose threads.”

Aoi watched Reita’s eyes cloud over, “When we were kids, he was always picked on.  He was beat up all the time.”

Aoi blurted, “Where were you?” 

He hadn’t meant it maliciously, but Reita winced all the same.

“He wasn’t alone.  He had somebody.”

The bassist moved towards a spare chair and plopped down into it, snuffing out his cigarette in an ashtray, “Not for long, but he did then.”

Aoi couldn’t stop himself from asking quietly, “But where were _you?_ ”

A small pocket of silence lulled between them before Reita clenched his fist, “I was a coward.  And that fucker still left even knowing that.  He showed up on my porch that day – confused, broken, and so fucking defeated.  I tried.  I tried everything.  But he started shooting up, started not caring.”

Something in Aoi’s gut twisted.

“I don’t want to see Uruha ever look like that again.”

He looked Aoi in the eye then, knuckles white and lip thin, “Don’t let him fall apart.”

Aoi looked away, eyes tracing the cracked floor tiles, “What can I do?”

“Whatever makes him smile like that.”

Reita then stretched in his chair with his hands high above his head, his point made.  He let a lackadaisical smile stretch across his youthful face, watched Aoi run his fingers on the top of his strings in thought.  Reita grinned wider and put a hand to his chin, “It’s funny.”

Aoi glanced up at him.  Reita let out a breath of laughter, “You almost remind me of someone.”

The elder man tucked a stray lock of his bangs behind his ear, feeling his sharp calluses rub against skin, “Who?”

Reita took out another cigarette and just smiled.

  
&&

_  
“Are you afraid you’re going to hurt me?”_

_Aoi panted, poised between Uruha’s thighs while clutching at his knees.  He was shaking, fingers sinking deep into the younger’s flesh, and Uruha just smiled – face flushed and lips wet.  Pre-cum was staining the sheets and his cock twitched with the slight roll of the blond-haired man’s hips._

_“C’mon, Aoi-kun.”_

_Aoi lowered his head, shutting his eyes tight.  Dark, black hair was sticking to his face.  His chest heaved and he felt so hot and rushed and dangerous.  Too dangerous and too loose in control.  Aoi grit his teeth and almost screamed ‘I can’t hurt you again-again-again’ when a hand ruffled his hair._

_He snapped his head up and it was Uruha spread before him.  Just Uruha.  Hooded eyes and beautiful leer._

_No cleats, grass-stained knees or juice-boxes._

_Just them._

_Uruha ran his hand down Aoi’s face, thumb touching his lip.  His caramel irises were almost sad, “You don’t have to care so much.”_

_He wrapped his long legs around Aoi’s waist, leaning up to whisper in the still man’s ear, “Won’t you obliterate me?”_

_Aoi narrowed his eyes and pushed the slurring guitarist back into the sheets, hand gripping his jaw, “Don’t ever fucking say that.”_

_A flicker of memory passed through Uruha’s glazed eyes._

_Aoi slipped his cock inside Uruha’s tight heat and sunk in, inch by inch.  He paused, breathing heavily, and looked Uruha right in the eye._

_“I will make you whole.”_

_He pulled back and snapped his hips forward.  Uruha whipped his head back, beautiful neck exposed._

_“Even if I have to wrap you in my arms every single day…”_

_He thrust in as Uruha cried and held onto his shoulders with all the force of a man with his last shard of hope._

_“Even if I have to break apart and give you each piece of me…”_

_Uruha gasped for air, seized him tight and Aoi kissed the corner of his open mouth._

_“Fuck, Uruha, I’m going to make you shine.”_

  
&&

  
When he got Reita’s text message, the heater had broken.  Uruha was hunched over by the bedside, gossamer sheet covering his legs and his fingers clutching the keypad tight.  Frost was taking over his window – a beautiful collage of snowflake sighs and wind shear tears.  It was one line without pretense.

_It’s over – I’m at the park._

Uruha sighed and closed his eyes.  He knew Reita’s relationship with the girl from their first gig was slightly tumultuous.  Constant demands to stay home and hold her hand.  Late-night knocks on his door when Reita was kicked out.  Jealous eyes and untrustworthy stories of _where she was last night_.  Uruha shifted his socked feet on the iced-over floorboards.

He thought of Aoi and their plans for that afternoon – finally a spare few hours where they could be alone without the others.  Groaning slightly, he felt his thumbs immediately send back a message.

_I’ll find you._

Grabbing a brown scarf, throwing on a pair of old Chucks, and a quick text to Aoi explaining the situation, Uruha slammed his apartment door shut. 

Reita’s fingers felt frost-bitten when Uruha’s hands brushed against them when placing the hot cup of ramen in his hands.  His breath was warm against Reita’s reddened nose as he leaned in to make sure the contents wouldn’t spill.  The bassist caught himself from shifting up to press his cheek against his best friend’s warmth.

Uruha plopped down  beside the distraught man on the bench and tilted his head back to watch snow flurries sway in the wind, “There will be a day when we can fix heaters…”

Reita snorted, grip tightening against the hot styrofoam, “I think my fingers are too cold to melt anyways.”

Uruha let a thoughtful silence fall between them.  He bumped his shoulder against Reita’s, pressing against him to offer anything he could.

“What happened?” He whispered.

Reita sighed, breath fogging in front of him, “Basically two years down the drain.  Should’ve done it sooner.  I think I was too desperate for any kind of closeness.”

The younger man tilted his head towards his friend, “Do you feel alone?”

Reita’s voice was small, eyes averted, “Sometimes.”

A small gush of wind ruffled the elder’s bangs.  Uruha opened his mouth to speak, but the other lowered his head.  “I have no right to talk about loneliness to you, Uru.”

Uruha only leaned in further, “Don’t – ”

“I’m sorry.  I’m sorry I left you back then.”

Reita slowly pushed against Uruha’s shoulder, scarf getting caught on the seam of his jacket, “I was young and scared and when you told me those things, it made me want to run.  And then you found _him_ and you were so _happy_.  I thought…”

He lifted his head and Kouyou winced at the red in his eyes, “I thought you didn’t need me anymore.”

“Reita, I – ”

Reita turned away, “I know.  I’m sorry, Kou.”

He kicked a pebble and the guitarist followed its fated path.  His hand found its way to Reita’s knee, lithe fingers squeezing tight.  He tried to find Reita’s eyes, “Akira.”

Akira shifted his head to face the younger once again.  Silent tears were whisking past his cheeks, chocolate eyes wet and forlorn – _desperately lost like they were boys again with nobody’s hand to hold_.

Kouyou leaned in closer, used his other hand to place fingertips against his tears, “I will always need you.”

And then Akira was smothering his mouth, crashing their lips together and shutting his eyes tight.  Kouyou gasped and reached out to grip Akira’s shoulder.  It was wrong – Akira’s lips thin and chapped against his own, so different from Aoi’s whose were so _familiar_ and right and imperfect.  It was only for a brief second – a slice of an instant.  Akira pulled back, pressed a chaste kiss to the corner of his mouth and hovered against it. 

His breaths were shaky, eyes still closed against the world.  Kouyou didn’t pull back, didn’t do much of anything but sit still and let Akira press his nose against his cheek.  Let him put a hand to his chest and fist a handful of his scarf.  Let his head slide down to his collarbone.

He breathed, “Akira…”

“I know.  I know, but just… let me stay here for a second.”  His voice was breaking, agony licking his chest.

And Kouyou gathered his oldest friend in his arms, cradled him, buried his nose in his bleached hair and inhaled his scent of pine and the past.  
 

&&

_  
“Who hurt you?”_

_Uruha stayed silent.  Aoi splayed his hand against his back, “I’ll never – ”_

_“ – You can’t promise that.”_

_His voice was raw and pained.  Aoi felt his chest ache and every part of him start to collapse.  Because he **couldn’t**.  He always broke promises and ran away and left hearts bleeding on the grass of soccer fields.  He always left those honey irises to become wet and cry and scream and wonder **why**.  He always broke things apart._

_He pressed his forehead into the back of Uruha’s neck._

_“I promise.”_   
  


&&

  
Aoi tangled his fingers into Uruha’s blond tresses, touching each strand of starlight.  They both lay in the afterglow of golden-shadows and glitter-splattered breaths.  He tugged and Uruha leaned in.

“I think I might..”

“Don’t say that word, okay?”

Aoi pressed his nose into Uruha’s temple, “Are you afraid?”

Uruha ran a finger along the dip in Aoi’s hip, lips pursed and pulse slowing, “It’s just that ‘love’ is evil.”

“How?”

“Have you ever spelt it backwards?”

Aoi chuckled softly, watched their shadows melt together on the wall.  “Okay.  None of that, then.”

Uruha smiled wryly, feeling Aoi’s other hand come to trace the scars of burnt-out innocence and emaciated hope.  Fingertips soft, breath stuttering against his ear.

Then, “But ‘love’ means that someone means everything, right?”

Uruha lolled his head to smile lazily against Aoi’s neck, “Sure.”

“I everything you.”

Uruha closed his eyes, felt Aoi dip his fingers into the tangles of his hair, and whispered, “I can’t be your everything, Aoi.”

And Aoi whispered right back.

_“Too late.”_   
  


&&

  
Somehow, they just might make it. 

Lounging in another motel bed, stage lights were still reflected within their eyes.  The sweat of performance was still caked on their skin and the kohl smeared onto Uruha’s eyes was smudging.  But Aoi’s eyeshadow was doomed from the start, so it’s okay.

“They sang along this time.”

Aoi quirked his lips, nodding and watched the smoke of his cigarette dance above their heads.  Uruha put his knee across Aoi’s and craned his neck down to catch the elder’s lips. 

They’re dry and chapped and perfect.

He smiles, and Aoi can almost see the sun, “Do you think comets believe car headlights are their long lost brothers?”

He hovers his lips against Aoi’s, lip ring scratching at his mouth.

Aoi breathes, tries not to sink too deep into _this_ , but edges his body closer.  He thinks of the lights on stage, the bass in his heart and the sight of Uruha shining.  He always thought of starlight, black starlight that smothered his soul.  But fuck…  why had he never realized…

Uruha sighed softly, smile easy and eyes warming, “Because everybody needs a soul mate, right?”

Aoi grabbed the back of his neck and buried his face into his shoulder.


	5. Age 27

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Twenty-seven-years-old, he slid a hand from his face to Aoi’s chest, fingers resting lightly upon the fabric of his shirt. It was silent for a moment, just the throb of his fingertips and the pounding of the elder’s heart pressing their beats to one another.

_Age 27_  
  
  
 _"So, what made you come here?"  
  
Twenty-four-years-old, Aoi looked up from his beer, sunglasses casting Ruki's pliable figure across the booth in sepia undertones.  He was lazily stirring his apple juice with a stray straw, lips in a pout and black-nailed fingers of his other hand tapping little beats along the table's wooden grain.  Aoi stiffened, immediately furrowing his brow, "Weren't we here to talk about you and -- "_   
  
_Ruki scoffed and rolled his eyes impatiently, "Just answer me, Aoi.  What made you come to Tokyo?"  
  
Aoi averted his gaze -- relieved that his eyes were hidden by his thick frames -- and fiddled with the wrapper from Ruki's straw.  "I guess what makes anyone come out here..."  
  
"You know that's a bullshit answer."  
  
Aoi jerked his head up and glared, "Why does this even matter."  
  
Ruki leaned forward, twirling his straw and spoke lowly, "This shouldn't be so hard to say, you know."  
  
The elder snorted and crossed his arms.  Ruki only shrugged and leaned back into his seat, "Fine.  I'll go first."  The vocalist __abandoned the straw and_ _never let his stare leave Aoi''s noir eyes, "I came here because I had nothing else.  A little boy who loved the dark and horror movies, who saw notes in his head -- that's all I was back there.  I knew I didn't belong anywhere else but here, where hearing phantom melodies **doesn't** mean you're crazy.  Where I wouldn't feel so fucking alone all the goddamn time because Tokyo is so **crowded**."  
  
Aoi watched Ruki put his chin in his hand, elbow digging into the table, "So tell me, Aoi.  Was it the same for you?  What **anyone** comes here for?"  
  
He looked away, "No."  
  
"And why not?"  
  
"Because I left everything.  I had everything before this."  
  
"So, why did you leave it?"  
  
Aoi let a breath escape through his lips, let Ruki see him break just a little.  
  
"To see if it would follow."  
  
  
_&&  
  
  
"I think we might be stardust, Aoi."  
  
Uruha rested his head against the elder's chest, hand up in the air -- lackadaisically spreading his fingers to watch the light run through the flesh.  His blond tresses were spread across each inch of Aoi's gray shirt.  They were somehow older -- the slight traces of rounded youth having left Uruha's face, laugh lines starting to engrave themselves beside Aoi's dark brown irises.    
  
His hand traced up the other's side.  He closed his eyes to the feel of soft flutters of breath that pulsed against his fingertips.  Aoi tried to imagine what _forever_ felt like.    
  
He couldn't exactly remember when he _remembered_.    
  
And he couldn't exactly describe the feeling in his heart when Uruha started to become _Kouyou_.  
  
"And why are we stardust?"  
  
Somewhere between the light freckle on Uruha's lower jaw he'd never noticed, and the way Reita slung a casual arm around those broad shoulders...  Somewhere past the purple shadow slathered upon his eyes and towards the way his smile warmed his chest...  
  
 _Sometime when Uruha began to press his nose into his shoulder, grinned against his skin and sighed -- he knew._  
  
 _The way their legs tangled together so perfectly, knees knocking; how the younger **looked** at him -- _  
  
Uruha rolled over and stared down at him, long locks tickling the other's neck and a soft smile on his bowed lips.  
  
"Because we're the scraps of wishes."  
  
Aoi cocked a brow at the taller man, his fingers splaying across the man's narrow waist, "That doesn't sound so good."  
  
Uruha's eyes began to shine -- just like they always did in those late nights when the moon seemed to blush, in those times when they traced each freckle across their skin; just like when they were young -- and he leaned in close enough to bump his nose against Aoi's.    
  
"No, no -- don't you see?"  
  
His hand cupped Aoi's cheek and guided his face towards the window of the night sky beside them -- showing Aoi the stars, the moon, the _whole damn universe_ , for just a moment's breath -- before turning him back to his warm grin and resting a thumb against the corner of his lip.  He sounded breathless:  
  
"We're the second chance."  
  
  
&&  
  
  
 _Twenty-five-years-old, Aoi almost told Uruha his name.  
  
It was a bitter-cold, winter day and they had been sitting upon the grass in some abandoned lot.  Both had snuck away from practice, cigarettes dangling from laughing lips as they raced down the halls in a desperate hurry not to get caught.  Somehow, the guitarists ended up here, smiles wide and eyes lazily regarding the overcast sky.  
  
The frozen tips of each emerald tendril were pricking Aoi's palms.  Uruha was talking, chuckling about something or other that was most likely to do with ducks and Reita's recent assessment that the tall man shared a resemblance with the aquatic creatures.  
  
His hand had been bumping against his own in the hard grass, flesh against flesh -- bone to bone.  Aoi stared at their hands, the cheerful prattling of that sweet baritone somewhere to his right, and edged his pinky closer.  Without missing a beat, the blond overlapped the elder's pinky with his own, jovially curling around the cold skin with his warmth.  
  
And Aoi almost said it.  
  
Yuu almost said it.  
_  
  
&&  
  
  
He had spilled everything to Ruki of course.  A random Thursday when Uruha was out on interviews, when Reita was with him, and when Kai was running around with management.  
  
Ruki sat there, cigarette between his teeth and his thumb poised over the corner of a magazine page, ready to disregard and flip.  Silver adorning each finger and lips pursed, the younger man was furrowing his brow at something particularly interesting on page seventy-three when Aoi, as always, blurted without preamble:  
  
"His name is Kouyou."  
  
Ruki stilled, eyebrows knitting together even deeper as he lifted his brown-haired head to stare quizzically towards Aoi's deflated figure.  His hand was still hovered over the page, fingertips curled under and ready, but he lowered it.  He took the cigarette out of his mouth and let the smoke sigh through the air.  
  
And Ruki waited like Aoi knew he would.  
  
Aoi licked his dry lips, fumbled with his hands on the table, "I met him when I was eight.  And then I met him again when I was nineteen."  
  
He averted his eyes from Ruki's patient stare and watched his fingers tangle together.  His lungs were gasping.  "I left him.  Made him start shooting up.  Made him become so broken and twisted and _hurt_."  
  
Aoi clenched his hands tight and closed his eyes, "His name is Kouyou and I don't know what to do."  
  
Ruki crushed his cigarette into an ashtray nearby before he leaned in and tried to look Aoi in the eye as he said gently, "You love him."  
  
He reached out and patted the space between them, Aoi's eyes opening to the sound.  Ruki's brown orbs, devoid of synthetic blue, stared straight through _everything_ in him, "You _love him_ like you did before."  A roll of his eyes and a huff of breath, " _Fuck_ , Aoi."  
  
Aoi lifted a hand to fist his raven locks, eyes drooping and _so tired_.  Ruki shook his head, almost disbelieving, "What have you been doing up until now?"  
  
"Think that Kouyou was still back at home.  Thinking Uruha was _Uruha_ and not _him_ ," Aoi grit his teeth harshly and bit out, " _Thinking that everything was so fucking simple._ "  
  
Ruki laughed, a dark chuckle that made Aoi slide his fingers out of his hair to regard him with shock.  The shorter brunet only smiled bitterly, "But isn't it?"  
  
He opened his magazine up again, still grinning sardonically as Aoi gaped at him.    
  
"Love isn't hard.  That's why falling is so easy."  
  
A flip of a page.  A flicker of those brown irises meeting Aoi's ebony.  
  
"Just fall and be happy and fuck the rest."  
  
  
&&  
  
  
" _Fuck!_ "  
  
Uruha was laughing, smile betaking the whole sky as it crashed down upon them.  Puddles were splashing across his knees, new jeans efficiently ruined as he cursed and sputtered in the sudden wetness of an abrupt fall storm.    
  
Aoi scowled and Uruha just grinned wider, taking his hands in his lithe, cold ones.  His lips were smudged with purple, auburn hair dark and sticking to his glowing cheeks.  There was a smear of eyeliner on his cheekbone.  His jacket was drenched the whole way through, stuck to his sides like molasses.  
  
The sky grumbled and Uruha threw his head back.  
  
Clear droplets were sliding down his throat as he held Aoi there with him in the rain.  The MIA bus scheduled to pick them up after the interview was caught somewhere in traffic.  
  
They only had the red lights of neon signs and the last few wisps of the sun to see, but Uruha had closed his eyes to the world.  Fingers were tightening their grip, the wind was biting the tip of his red nose --  
  
\-- and _Uruha-Kouyou-Uruha_ sighed.  
  
He lifted his head back up, smile now subdued and something more beautiful.  It sat there peacefully on his bowed lips, healed from all their scars, and Aoi found himself stepping closer to catch its warmth.    
  
He breathed out, not wanting to speak louder in case this dream collapsed around his knuckles -- in case he woke up and this man was no longer _him_.  
  
Because he was.  Every fucking part, every motion and every word.  
  
" _You're something good._ "  
  
Uruha tilted his head, caramel eyes blinking back the rain, "And what makes you say that?"  He smirked playfully  and tugged on their laced hands, "You've seen me be anything _but_ good."  
  
But Aoi wasn't rising to the bait this time; he didn't want to laugh and poke and prod.  He didn't want to giggle in the rain and _forget_.  
  
He wondered, for the briefest of moments, if Uruha had forgotten -- whether he had been smeared out of the younger man's past as nothing but a bone-deep bruise.  Whether _Yuu_ had been thrown away along with the stained hypodermic needles.  The blond was only smirking at him, eyes radiating through the splatter of rain, and he found himself so close to screaming, _begging_ , for forgiveness -- to let him in just _one more time_.  
  
Instead, he leaned in close, settled his head underneath Uruha's chin and put his ear against his collarbone.    
  
Wet, raven locks sticking to his skin, Uruha let out a breath.  His lips trembled, mischievous eyes now fading to an undefined softness as he felt the elder sink into him.  
  
Aoi closed his eyes, felt Uruha break away a hand to touch at his back.  Feather-soft.  There.  
  
" _You'll always be good._ "  
  
  
&&  
  
  
Aoi put a shaking hand to his mouth and shut his eyes tight.  
  
"Are you ever going to tell me what's wrong?"  
  
\--  
  
 _The soccer ball was heavy in his hands.  His eyes were wide, a shocking honey hue that was laced with poignant fear.  His cleats were dug into the earth, keeping him still when all he wanted to do was **run**.  And catch him.  
  
Call him back._  
  
\--  
  
Aoi was huddled against the closed door of his room, Uruha's mellow drawl echoing somewhere above him on the other side.  He only lowered his head, eyes now snapped open and disbelieving of _how he never fucking noticed._   He was too busy with guitar, with dreams, with running away, with falling so fucking hard for someone he already --  
  
\--  
  
 _But when the elder told him, "I'm leaving now," Kouyou couldn't move.  He was nailed to the spot in the clearing, bright sun shining on his raven locks that now touched the slope of his neck.  Time was suspended, slowing down around the retreating figure of the other boy and making the air seem so heavy.  His hands gripped the ball tighter because that's all he had left to hold onto.  
  
\--_  
  
The elder heard a slight thump, signaling Uruha had taken a seat against the door himself, and continued to press his lips against the palm of his trembling hand.  
  
"Aoi..."  
  
\--  
  
 _He watched him walk away, silhouette becoming blurrier with each breath he took.  
  
\--_  
  
He almost corrected him.  _Almost screamed his name and begged to never have Uruha-Kouyou-Uruha say the word 'hollyhock' ever again._  
  
He whimpered instead.  
  
"You're being a _little_ ridiculous.  I tell Reita that I'll play soccer with him later and next thing I know, you're barricading yourself in your room."  
  
Aoi shakes his head silently, mulling over what he had heard, something so much deeper than just menial words -- 

_"Alright, alright -- we'll play soccer later.  Jeez, learn to shut up for a second, 'kira."_  
  
Aoi reached up to tangle his fingers into his midnight hair.  _Fuck_.  
  
He had suspected for awhile, but to have it so clearly shown, so suddenly careen towards him  and shake every doubt  from his soul -- Aoi bit the inside of his cheek hard.  
  
\--   
_  
When he had told the young:  "You can't stop me" -- Kouyou had wanted to.  He yearned to be able to uproot himself and drop the stupid soccer ball and run after him.  Tackle him into the grass and bury his fingers into those long black locks and **make him stay.**_  
  
\--  
  
"Are you jealous?  If you really want to, you can play with us.  It's really not something to shut the door in my face about..."  
  
 _Fuck, fuck_.  
  
"Aoi -- "  
  
"Stop calling me that."  
  
A heavy silence hovered against him.  He could hear Uruha breathing softly, trying not to shatter whatever cusp they just entered -- careful not to step on any shards of whatever was just broken.  
  
He bit his lip, tasted metallic crimson and whispered hoarsely, "You told me...  Back then, you told me not to tell you, but..."  
  
Uruha stayed quiet, and the other man could imagine him tilting his head against the wood, caramel irises glazed against the oak paneling.  
  
"I think I..."  
  
He stopped.  His tongue felt dry and his words were drowning inside his chest.  Something wet was falling against his cheeks.  But all he could think of was how _Uruha didn't remember_.  
  
"Come with us -- "  
  
Aoi covered his face with his hands and bent over his knees, a raw sob ripping through his throat.  
  
" _You don't even know my name!_ "  
  
He heard the door handle jiggle back and forth, "Aoi, open the door."  
  
Stars exploded in front of his eyes as he whipped his head back to slam against the wood behind him, " _Fuck, just stop!"_  
  
He didn't know how Uruha got the door open.  All he knew in the following five seconds was the callused hands upon his face, something like the sun flush against him, and the pulse of another's heartbeat on his aching chest.  He had his eyes closed even as Uruha traced his thumb across his cheeks, rubbing the salt of his tears from his alabaster skin.  Chest heaving, breath ragged, Aoi let his head sag into Uruha's hands, body so _tired_ of keeping the glass-shards of the past in his ribs.  
  
Uruha's breath was heavy above him, fingertips soft and touching every part of his face because he knew it felt like he was slipping away and -- _Uruha would never let him_.  
  
A broken murmur, "I'm not good for you."  
  
Uruha stilled for a moment before trying to lift up his head and look him in the eye, but Aoi kept them closed, brow knitted together and the ache that filled each blood vessel and pore.  
  
\--  
  
 _He had left.  The field was empty.  It had been empty for five minutes before the tears finally came and then the gut-wrenching feeling of being torn apart.  He lifted a hand from the ball to his chest, mouth open in muted horror that this **hurt so much**.  
  
\--_  
  
"You're wrong."  Uruha kissed the tear that was sliding to his jaw.  
  
Aoi grit his teeth in a tortured grimace and tried to jerk his face out of Uruha's tender hands, " _You don't know what I am._ "  
  
But Uruha didn't let him, merely pulled him close and slid his hands up his face to softly touch his temples, "Yes, I do."  
  
\--   
  
_Because he didn't understand.  What had he done to make those dark brown eyes become noir, to make that shy smile disappear?_  
  
\--   
  
"You _don't._ "  
  
He didn't realized he had bit out the words until he heard their echo.  And then the younger put his lips against his cheekbone and whispered, "I do."  
  
He kissed the spot  and then moved to his mouth to breathe the words against his skin, "I know that you hate celery.  I know that you love Tony Chopper and floral shirts.  I know that gray is your favorite color.  And I know that your broken, rude, selfish, gentle, beautiful, insane and that your heart is fucking gorgeous."  
  
He slid a hand from the man's face to Aoi's chest, fingers resting lightly upon the fabric of his shirt.  It was silent for a moment, just the throb of his fingertips and the pounding of the elder's heart pressing their beats to one another.  Aoi felt Uruha spread his fingers wide, trying to cover every inch of his metronome.  
  
"What would I do without this heart?"  
  
\--  
  
 _Kouyou gasped, lungs stuttering at the feeling of loss and he let a sob escape his bowed lips._  
  
\--  
  
The elder took a shaky breath, finally meeting Uruha's warm eyes as he whispered, "I'm not Aoi."  
  
Uruha only smiled sadly at him, something so beautifully tragic upon those lips that made the sun shudder.  He wiped away another stray tear before whispering back gently, " _Tell me who you are tonight._ "  
  
And Aoi could have told him, could have spilled his broken heart upon the floorboards and watch the scarlet seep into the knotholes -- watch Uruha's face fall and crumble and everything slip from his grasp because _wasn't irony a frigid whore?_  
  
He could have said it.  The words were on his tongue, ready to tear apart the chains that barred the past from trickling into the present.  
  
\--   
  
_With the sun still shining and the sky echoing the clearest blue in days, Kouyou broke._  
  
\--  
  
But he said, "Whoever you need me to be."  
  
Silence lolled before Uruha's lips met his own, a soft and sweet touch that lingered in the aftermath of tears, "Fucking sap.  I just need _you_."  
  
  
&&  
  
  
The annual GazettE Barbeque had been a tradition for as long as the boys had been hungry for something other than reheated ramen and bottles of juice they had to ration out during the week.  Even when money started to become steady and their fridges began to fill up, the once-a-year stakeout at the park was the pinnacle event on the band's schedule.  
  
Of course, Kai was tending to the grill -- having usurped it after their manager mistook vinegar for cooking oil -- and Aoi found himself perching his chin atop the younger man's shoulder.  
  
"Done yet?"  
  
An easy smile was sent his way, though the drummer's eyes glistened dangerously, "No, they haven't cooked in the time it took you to ask me before, walk over to Uruha and then walk back here and ask me _again_."  
  
"So when _will_ they be done?"  
  
The spatula shook in Kai's hand, "When I say:  _Hey guys, the steaks are done!_ "  
  
Aoi pouted, "And that will be in how long...?"  
  
"...I bet you were such a brat as a kid."  
  
Aoi felt a tug on his sleeve, "Aoi-shi~  Stop pissing off Kai before he serves us meat drenched in salmonella."  
  
The older man turned around and found Uruha smirking at him, a playful tilt to his head making a few blond strands of his hair fall into his glinted eyes.  He didn't have makeup on, the blush on his cheeks only from the sun's heat and his eyes a warm caramel without the help of bronzer.    
  
Aoi smirked back and let himself be pulled away from an exasperated Kai into Uruha's tall frame.  Large hands that had created screaming riffs and crooning melodies intertwined with his own along his stomach.  He leaned back, head securely placed beneath the blond's chin.  He could hear the slight chuckle in Uruha's breath, the steady beat in his chest.  
  
"You're a handful."  
  
"You know you like it."  
  
Uruha raised an amused brow at him, "Oh?"  
  
Aoi nodded his head firmly, a mischievous light catching in his dark brown eyes, "That's how it works.  I get out of hand -- I mess everything up and scream and get angry and spiteful.  And then you come and everything's okay again."  
  
Uruha bumped his nose against Aoi's cheek, "So, I'm the lion-tamer then?"  
  
Aoi turned his head to catch Uruha's lips in a chaste kiss, smile stealing across his face, "Something like that."  
  
"So, are we really going to have to eat with you two doing that here?"  
  
The two guitarists turned to see a disgruntled Reita fold his arms across his chest, face humorlessly devoid of any joy at seeing the two intertwined so closely.  Ruki came up behind him and clapped the bassist's back, sending Aoi a knowing glance before breaking out into a conniving grin.  
  
He nudged Reita's shoulder, "How about this?  We have a bet.  And if those two lose, they have to sit on opposite ends of the table from each other."  
  
Reita perked up and slyly swiveled his gaze to the shorter man, "And if we lose?"  
  
Ruki scoffed playfully, "We won't."  
  
Uruha leaned onto Aoi's back in interest, "So, what's the bet?"  
  
Ruki hummed for a second, eyes cast to the ground as if search for the answer in the emerald tendrils.  After a minute, his chocolate irises were lit with confidence, "A race."  
  
Aoi rolled his eyes, "That's not a bet."  
  
"Whatever with the technicalities.  It's a challenge."  
  
Uruha didn't seem swayed by Ruki's aplomb or the fact that Reita was nodding gleefully, "Where to?"  
  
Ruki was already facing away to the clearing up ahead and looked over his shoulder at the two, "You'll know when it's the end."  
  
Aoi didn't remember anyone saying _go_ or the agreement to the starting point at all.  All he knew was that he was running, that Uruha was right beside him and the sun felt wonderful upon his skin.  The light shirt he was wearing was fluttering in the breeze and his mind immediately flashed imaged of dirty cleats and checker-patterned balls.  He chanced a glance at Uruha, watching how his long legs seemed to leap and bound rather than chug along.  It was hypnotizing in the way that his muscles contracted  and extended, as if he were an extension of the wind itself -- a fleeting, intangible entity.  
  
And then Uruha dashed forward, a sudden streak of blue plaid and blond that Aoi almost missed in his blind race to an uncertain end.  Suddenly, he couldn't see Ruki and Reita anymore.  All he could spot in this expanse of green and blue and _warmth_ was Uruha.  How his shoulder blades moved languidly, how his hair was like gilded ribbons streaking in the wind.    
  
Uruha looked over his shoulder at that exact moment -- the one where everything looked so damn clear and bright and _right_.  Seeing the jovial yet panting countenance of Aoi behind him, he laughed.  Aoi felt his chest tighten at the sound and pushed himself forward, suddenly compelled to _catch, catch, keep_.  
  
 _I'll catch you one day._  
  
It was a chase as Uruha veered off into a different field, the park trees suddenly gone as it was just them and the grass.  The taller man was still laughing, absolute glee reflecting from his features.  Those bowed lips spread wide in the smile that Uruha only reserved for those truly happy moments -- the ones that took over his whole face and made him _shine_.  
  
Aoi's chest felt like it was about to burst when he finally reached him, springing forward to tackle the younger in the grass.  They were twenty-three again.  They were nineteen again; thirteen, eight.  
  
Rolling in the grass, their older knees knocked together -- grass staining their uninhibited laughter.  Because they were free here.  
  
Uruha finally found himself atop Aoi, straddling his waist and happily placing his palms over his chest.  He could feel the other's heart beat fast, a racing pulse like his.  The blond gave the dark-haired guitarist a cheeky grin.  It soon changed to a portrait of shock and then to unrestrained amusement as Aoi propelled himself forward until he was atop the squirming Uruha.  
  
The other laughed because there was nothing else to say; he let himself be pinned to the sweet-smelling grass, let Aoi's nimble fingers spread across his chest like a million promises.  
  
And Aoi believes, for a just a second in time, that he's looking at the sun.  
  
He kisses him slowly then, silencing the laughter and making his bones melt from frost.  
  
"Caught you."  
  
And then the man beneath him _looks_ at him, caramel to ebony.  
  
"You've always had me, Yuu."


End file.
